Crested Butte in 1980 still echoed with the hammers of miners, not the rumble of knobby tires on singletrack. But that was about to change as a young blue-eyed man named Mike Rust wrenched madly, transforming old Schwinn cruiser bikes into some of Colorado’s first mountain bikes. When the Californians like Gary Fisher and Joe Breeze arrived to test their fancy new bikes on CB’s storied terrain, Rust was ready and spun his way uphill into the ranks of the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame. Like fresh raw singletrack, Rust cut a path through Colorado’s early days of mountain biking in a swirl of dust mixing innovation, independence, irreverence and a band of Irish brothers into America’s true wild west.

Then he dissappeared without a trace.

The mystery of Rust’s life and disappearance is chronicled in the new film The Rider and the Wolf, from Grit & Thistle films.